Sarah Smiles
By: Christina Jane
Sarah Smiles is a story based on my personal journey through
adopting a little girl, Sarah who has a smile that lights up a room and has
several special needs. I talk about all the hoops that I needed to jump through
in order to adopt Sarah in the first place when she was a baby as well as the
battle I have gone through in getting Sarah the mental health treatment that
she needs as she got older in a state where mental health care for children is hard
to find. Sarah has cerebral palsy, she was born drug affected, has fetal
alcohol syndrome, failure to thrive, along with extreme behavior problems and
then she was diagnosed with Mitochondrial Diabetes as well as Mitochondrial
Myopathy (muscle weakness), Encephalomyopathy (Brain and central nervous system
disease), lactic acidosis (buildup of a cell waste product), and Stroke-like
episodes (partial vison loss, or other neurological abnormalities) or MELAS as
it is also known.
I am hoping that reading about the journey that I have been on with a special needs child might in some way help others on their own journey even if it is to know that they are not alone.
I am hoping that reading about the journey that I have been on with a special needs child might in some way help others on their own journey even if it is to know that they are not alone.
